Sorry God Smack…

http://lejournaldemontreal.canoe.ca/journaldemontreal/

chroniques/nathalieelgrablylevy/archives/2011/05/20110505-071312.html

I hope I didn’t miss the point of this article but I have to take objection to at least two main points:

“Quand l’art ne permet pas de mettre du beurre sur les épinards”

Art is not about making money. Since when is a painting or a piece of music ‘good’ just because it’s been sold? I hate the band God Smack but they sold lots of albums. Liberal economics, by its very nature, presupposes that the market knows what people want. But unless everything is allowed to get its moment in the spotlight then how will we know if it will be in demand? One could not predict how an imposing iron Calder statue would become a great piece of so many cityscapes.

“Il n’existe que deux raisons pour lesquelles un artiste vit dans la misère.”

Spoken like a person that has never had an artistic thought in her life; people that have an innate or learned drive to produce something for artistic means, do so because they want to, not because they want to make money. Surely this sound naïve, and of course there are artists that are driven by money, but at the core of any artistic drive is the need, almost the necessity, to create something.

When the state fosters an environment that allows people to be creative the benefits are hard to quantify but it has been shown that people are more inclined to participate in cultural events if they are exposed to them. The state should play a role in keeping culture and art at the center of our community.